Talk about a busy couple of weeks – SETC the week before last, and USITT this last week. The JimOnLight.com Flickr Group is ever-growing (134 members so far!) and the photos are amazing. Check out a large selection from this last week’s additions!

As quickly as it began, USITT 2011 is over for me – I’m sitting in the airport right now at 6am EST waiting to board my flight to ORD, then on to OKC. So many O’s, and none of them enjoyable.

Our conference session went really well – lots of audience, good questions, and great conversation! I found it quite hilarious to hear the comment “it’s so great when someone actually prepares for their USITT Panel session.” From what I understand there were a handful of people who didn’t bother to prepare for their panel session for presentation, and that is just irresponsible, especially when students are coming to see you speak about what they love the most.

I’ll be missing the USITT Stage Expo show floor this year, but I had a chance to walk around the Expo during load-in yesterday. Make sure that you go around and talk to people, everybody! Remember – conversations are your endless doorways to opportunity. After all, this IS the Entertainment Business!

Just a quick travel note for those of you flying out of Charlotte this weekend – make sure that you have all of your stuff together when you travel through security at Charlotte-Douglas Airport. Charlotte TSA has no sense of humor, no patience for pretty much anything, and they are very condescending to all. If you want to get to your flight on time after standing in the very long lines at CLT, then make sure you act like an expert traveler. Otherwise you’re gonna get called stupid, like I heard Charlotte TSA call an elderly traveler this morning! Where are we, Germany in 1942?

BE SAFE EVERYBODY! It was so amazing to see you all again! Wednesday night’s 2011 #USITT #Tweetup was outstanding this year! It was AWESOME to see everybody out last night!

Many of us are currently on the way to Charlotte, North Carolina for the United States Institute of Theatre Technologies Conference and Expo 2011, or USITT. This year, however, I won’t be taking part in the Expo part, I have too much going on to stay this year for more than a day. I’m lighting two shows back-to-back, The House of Atreus (written by D. Lance Marsh) and The Wedding Singer. Yes, that one. I’m also working on a consulting gig and planning some large scale light art happenings.

I’m heading to USITT to present a panel called Marketing in the Digital World and Social Media for the Lighting Professional with Justin Lang from iSquint.net and Andrea Bilkey from Texas Tech. Come check us out, we’re from 2:30pm to 3:45pm on Wednesday, March 9, 2011.

Life’s pretty busy for me right now. Howsabout you? Are you going to be at USITT Wednesday night around 730pm? Come over to the #USITT #Tweetup, happening at Strike City Bowling. Check the Facebook page. It’s the only event I’m gonna have time to hit this year – but LDI is coming, and you can bet your silly ass I’ll be there, WITH lights on.

You know, I read a lot. Like, a LOT a lot. Sometimes I wonder how the hell I fit all that stuff in my brain!

One of my favorite magazines to read (actually hold in my hand and read) is Stage Directions. If you’ve ever been to USITT, LDI, NAB, or LightFair, you’ve run into Jacob. If you’ve ever been out with me at one of those conferences and been out in the evening where big boy and big girl beverages are consumed, you’ve probably run into Jacob hanging out with me and the group. Jacob’s the guy on the right in the image above – you can always see him walking around conferences with his little notepad, taking notes and getting ready to write awesome articles.

Stage Directions is having a subscriber drive right now. Here’s the awesome thing about it: it’s totally 100% free, and you can receive it digitally. So really, what is it that you have to either A) lose, or B) keep you from getting a free awesome subscription to Stage Directions?

Go sign up for your free Stage Directions subscription! Seriously. If you’re in the Theatrical trades, you should be reading this magazine.

I’m in Atlanta today and tomorrow judging the SETC 2011 Design Competition, which starts today. This is such an exciting time for student designers, and as students set up their design displays and get ready for judging, there is a lot of buzz here at the Atlanta Hilton!

I’m going to be offering a very special prize to the winner of the SETC Lighting Design award for this year – I haven’t told the student designers yet, but the winner of the SETC Lighting Design award will get to have their design work displayed in a post on JimOnLight.com for the world to see!

I am very honored to be presenting with some amazing designers who also have the fortune of being amazing people. The scenic design respondent is Judy Juracek. You might know Judy from her line of excellent texts on painting, like Surfaces: Visual Research for Artists, Architects, and Designers. Judy is a scenic artist in New York City, and she’s worked everywhere from film and television to Broadway, opera, and industrial events.

Costume designer Fred Lloyd is here responding to the costume design entries this year at SETC. Fred is an amazing guy with a distinguished career – most recently as the Costume Supervisor for AMC’s Walking Dead, and is currently the Resident Costume Designer for the Gainesville Theatre Alliance.

It feels great to be a part of such an excellent group of designers and artists, hands down. If you’re here at the SETC 2011 Conference, please come to the Design Competition and Distinguished Guest Designer Presentations tonight at 7pm in the Grand Salons A and B. I hope to see you there!

A conversation I had about programming “ambidexterity” and console choice the other day has been sticking in my mind like white on rice, a glass of milk, and a paper plate in a snowstorm. I’m curious as to what the JimOnLight.com Community as a whole considers its favorite console or consoles.

Please participate in this quick little poll below – if you’re a JimOnLight.com RSS feed reader, come on over to the website and participate in the poll! Choose one of the answers from the list below.

If you happen to program on something or really like programming on something NOT on this list, would you leave a comment and let us know what that console might be?

I just got ahold of the videos made of the SeaChanger booth at the 2010 NAB Show in Las Vegas – I had the pleasure of interviewing a bunch of influential lighting industry people at the 2010 NAB Show, which was an absolute blast!

Check out this first video made at the 2010 NAB Show – JimOnLight.com interviews JEFF RAVITZ!

Finally – we’ve been working hard on this app, and by “we” I do mean David Fox, the Chief Web Strategist for JimOnLight.com. David’s been tuning the JimOnLight.com App for a while, and we’ve just recently gotten iTunes Store acceptance. Now you can get a formatted JimOnLight.com experience on your mobile device!

Let’s not forget the most important part here, folks. The JimOnLight.com App for iPhone and Android is TOTALLY FREE!